> >Are there anything else?
>> A few things to note:
>> - I'm not too fond of the recursive structure of SpcfName. This
> structure has cropped up a few times on this list recently - maybe we
> have a few converts from LISP.
[advanced; skip if you haven't seen Scheme/Lisp code or recursion.]
We also have to bring up that Python doesn't implement "tail call
elimination". Python's recursion depth is limited, so certain
constructions that work in Scheme/Lisp don't work so well in Python, at
least, not without some adjustments.
As a concrete example, a Python function like:
###
def broken_fact(n, k = 1):
if n == 0:
return k
return broken_fact(n-1, n * k)
###
is broken for any "n" that's greater than the system's recursion limit.
###
>>> sys.getrecursionlimit()
1000
>>> broken_fact(2)
2
>>> broken_fact(3)
6
>>> broken_fact(1000)
>>> broken_fact(1000)
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
File "<stdin>", line 4, in broken_fact
File "<stdin>", line 4, in broken_fact
[... a LOT of lines cut. *grin*]
File "<stdin>", line 4, in broken_fact
File "<stdin>", line 4, in broken_fact
RuntimeError: maximum recursion depth exceeded
###
One place we might see this kind of RuntimeError, in practice, is with
nongreedy regular expressions. Python's implementation of nongreedy
regexes uses a recursive algorithm that dies badly on certain inputs.
###
>>> s = 'Begin ' + 1000*'a very long string ' + 'end'
>>> re.match('Begin (\w| )*? end', s).end()
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
File "/usr/lib/python2.3/sre.py", line 132, in match
return _compile(pattern, flags).match(string)
RuntimeError: maximum recursion limit exceeded
###
(this example is taken from: http://www.python.org/doc/lib/node109.html)
So although this thing is mostly esoteric, it can effect us.
That being said, there is a technique to work around the lack of tail
recursion, called "trampolined style".
http://www.cs.indiana.edu/hyplan/sganz/publications/icfp99/paper.pdf
It allows us to write recursive programs that avoids growing the call
stack, even in languages that don't natively support tail call
elimination.
Here's a concrete example of a trampolined version of that factorial
function, using the trampolining technique:
###
def trampolined_fact(n, k=1):
if n == 0:
return land(k)
return bounce(trampolined_fact, n-1, k*n)
def fact(n):
"""Returns the factorial of n."""
return trampoline(trampolined_fact, n)
def trampoline(function, *args):
"""Bounces a function over and over, until we "land" off the
trampoline."""
bouncer = bounce(function, *args)
while True:
bouncer = bouncer[1](*bouncer[2])
if bouncer[0] == 'land':
return bouncer[1]
def bounce(function, *args):
"""Bounce back onto the trampoline, with an upcoming function call."""
return ["bounce", function, args]
def land(value):
"""Jump off the trampoline, and land with a value."""
return ["land", value]
###
And now we're in business:
###
>>> fact(1000)
4023872600770937735437024339230039857193748642107146325
4379991042993851239862902059204420848696940480047998861
0197196058631666872994808558901323829669944590997424504
0870737599188236277271887325197795059509952761208749754
6249704360141827809464649629105639388743788648733711918
1045825783647849977012476632889835955735432513185323958
4630755574091142624174743493475534286465766116677973966
6882029120737914385371958824980812686783837455973174613
6085379534524221586593201928090878297308431392844403281
23155861103697680135730421616874760... [text cut]
###
Anyway, I thought this was really cool. *grin* Hope this helps!